I hope that you all enjoyed the Summer and took advantage of the lovely weather that we had this year. On behalf of the staff of St. Louis Senior Primary School, I am delighted to welcome you to the 2018/19 school year. In particular, we extend a warm welcome to those of you, who are sending your child/children to St. Louis Senior Primary School for the first time, especially our four 2nd classes who have joined us from the Infant School. We hope that their years here will be very happy and successful.

We had a busy Summer here in St. Louis. During the Summer months many projects were undertaken. Our girl’s toilets were refurbished from a grant received from the Department of Education.

We also upgraded and modernised one of our school yards, the yard is now bright and cheerful and is covered in a synthetic grass which is child friendly. (Photographs are on our school website and blog). In addition, the School had WIFI installed in the classrooms, which will allow us to use the most modern teaching tools available to us. These projects were the result of all the wonderful fundraising carried out by the Parents Association and the voluntary contributions made by you all. I want to sincerely thank everybody including the Board of Management, who made these projects possible.

On behalf of the school community, I would like to welcome back all our teachers and staff. We have some new faces amongst us this year. Ms. Bairbre Munnis is working with our Special Education Department, Ms. Elaine Diffney is in fourth class and Ms. Róisín Bennett is in second class. Ms. Fiona Corbett is our new SNA and Ms. Sinead Leydon is covering for Ms. Emily Maguire who is on maternity leave.

Finally, thank you for your continued support, and I look forward to working with you in the year ahead.

Standardised Testing in English and Maths is taking place at present in all classes in St. Louis SPS. End-of-year assessments will also be taking place in other Curricular areas across the school. We very much value the data we collect from these tests as they help us as a school to prepare lessons for the students that meet their specific needs. Do remember, however, that these tests are just a sample of the evidence collected regarding your child’s learning, ability and progress. Teachers use different methods of gathering evidence about how and what our students learn on an ongoing basis. Standardised and end-of-year testing are just a small sample of this evidence. This information, along with other teacher observations and assessments, is used to celebrate students’ current learning, and to help make decisions about next steps for future learning.

For further information on Standardised Testing and interpreting STen scores; please refer to the NCCA leaflet for parents:

Here in St. Louis we place a strong emphasis on the holistic development of each child as a valued individual. We celebrate the academic, artistic, musical, technological, sporting, social, emotional, physical and spiritual growth of our students. We are immensely proud of all of our students and their achievements through their time with us.

Friendship Fortnight runs for 2 weeks every school year in the month of November. This allows the children to learn about the value of friendship and how friendships are made and sustained. The school has decided to brand the fortnight “Friendship Fortnight” rather than “Anti-Bullying Fortnight”.

We believe the term anti-bullying has negative connotations for the children. It is better to highlight the benefit of friendships, as we feel that a child who knows the value of friendship is less likely to become a bully or a victim of bullying. But we are not ignoring the issue of bullying itself. As a school we are going to focus on all aspects of bullying, text messages, cyber-bullying, etc.

The staff of St Louis SPS are taking particular care to monitor behaviour and explain to the children the damage caused by bullying. We are making it clear that we are a “telling school” where children are encouraged to show dignity and respect for themselves and others. The principal aim of Friendship Fortnight is to ensure that all the children in our school can learn and play in a safe and caring environment during their time in school here.